There’s more to being a responsible beer snob than just not burning down the PBR plant. You have to find better ways of communicating what you live about craft beer and learn to pick your battles and to be a friend to everyone when it comes to beer. At this point, you’re probably saying that here at BWS we don’t have access to a dictionary wherein the word snob is defined. Close. We’ve never really embraced “snob” as a useful positive descriptor, and don’t even get us started on “geek.”

Unfortunately, both words are these kind of amorphous descriptors people have attached themselves to and there’s no point fighting. So, if you must describe yourself as a beer snob, at least try and be a responsible beer snob. In this week’s show, we talk about some of the cultural aspects of craft beer that could use friendly communal support.

The Beer Glass Matters Less Than You Think

Stories about why glasses are good or bad for beer are common and a little bit hackneyed, but we keep reading them so people keep writing them. I’ll probably write one or two myself this year. As we discuss in the show, very, very few people could take the Pepsi Challenge with whether or not a glass is appropriate for a beer. Once way to be a responsible beer snob is to grant the point, especially since there’s a larger one. Shaker pints are too small.

Beer glasses should be 20 ounces. That is, a pint plus a little room for the head, which can and does make a difference in the way a beer tastes. The thing is, that isn’t about the bartender, it is about the drinker. For a lot of people, paying for a pint of beer means that they want 16 ounces of liquid, not 14 ounces of liquid and some foam.

That said, a 12 ounce beer fits in a straight “shaker” glass pretty nicely.

Here’s Why You Actually Shouldn’t Serve Your Beer In A Pint Glass

As anti-snobs, we’ll be the first to tell you that there’s no need to purchase ultra-specific glassware in order to enjoy a drink. For instance, as long as you have a good set of wine glasses, you don’t have to buy Bordeaux glasses and white wine glasses (though if you want to, go for it!).

Better than a Beer Festival?

In last week’s show we spoke about how beer festivals have kind of run amok. This might be an appropriate solution: pop up taprooms. They’re like beer gardens that breweries in larger cities are setting up in places that don’t normally have anything at all. It helps one imagine a world of food trucks and temporary tap rooms and dining in the local park.

Boston’s Pop-Up Taproom Trend Continues as Night Shift Secures 2 Outdoor Spaces | Brewbound.com

A growing number of Boston-area beer companies have turned to pop-up beer gardens in an effort to engage consumers during the summer months. Despite an array of outdoor options for drinkers to grab a beer on a hot summer day, Boston-area craft brewery Night Shift still sees opportunity to expose local consumers to its brands.

 

Let’s talk about flavors, not styles

Bringing people who generally don’t like or care about craft beer into the mix can be a challenge when you’re a jerk about it. And, if we’re honest, we all have been someplace between a little jerky and completely insufferable when we’re trying to talk about beers we love. But (and this is a great tip for servers as well as normal people) what if you just talk about food flavors and suggest a beer style that way?

There are so many ways to talk about beer,